Voters want Labor to allow MPs more freedom to break ranks

A narrow majority of Australians believes Labor should relax its rules on internal dissent after Senator Fatima Payman quit the party in a dispute over Palestine, leading 54 per cent of voters to say caucus members should have more freedom to vote as they wish.

The exclusive findings highlight public support for politicians to speak out against the party line when they feel strongly on big issues, with only 16 per cent rejecting the case for relaxing the caucus rules that enforce Labor solidarity.

Senator Fatima Payman is seeking to build her support base after quitting Labor on July 4.Credit: Fairfax Media

But 41 per cent of voters believe Payman should leave parliament because she was elected to the Senate as a Labor candidate, while there is only minority support for the cause that led her to quit the party – her move to vote with the Greens on recognising Palestine.

Payman is seeking to build her support base after quitting Labor on July 4, while religious groups are vowing to run candidates against the government in seats with high Muslim populations.

The findings in the Resolve Political Monitor, conducted for this masthead by research company Resolve Strategic, show that Australians remain divided on the recognition of Palestine and the idea of a two-state solution with a separate Palestinian nation.

When asked about the international debate on the issue, 30 per cent of voters agreed that Australia should not recognise Palestine until there was a peaceful two-state solution with Israel, while 22 per cent said Australia should recognise Palestine sooner and 18 per cent said neither option was acceptable. Another 29 per cent were undecided.

The results are based on responses from 1603 eligible voters who were surveyed online from July 10 to 13 and selected to form a representative sample of the wider population, producing results with a margin of error of 2.4 percentage points.

The survey gave respondents the wording of the motion in the Senate that led Payman to side with the Greens and break with Labor by calling for the Senate to recognise the state of Palestine.

The survey found that 26 per cent agreed and 42 per cent disagreed, while 32 per cent were unsure.

In the next question, the survey gave respondents the wording of a government motion that supported the recognition of Palestine as part of a peace process in support of a two-state solution and an enduring peace.

On this question, 32 per cent agreed and 27 per cent disagreed, while 41 per cent were unsure.

The West Australian senator, who was born in Kabul and came to Australia at the age of eight, quit the ALP on July 4 after days of tension with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and other senior Labor figures about whether she would be loyal to caucus decisions on policy.

“Unlike my colleagues, I know how it feels to be on the receiving end of injustice,” she said at the time.

“My family did not flee from a war-torn country to come here as refugees for me to remain silent when I see atrocities inflicted on innocent people.

“Witnessing our government’s indifference to the greatest injustice of our times makes me question the direction the party is taking.”

Those remarks angered Labor MPs who believed other caucus members had also experienced injustice in their lives, while pointing to government statements that called for a ceasefire in Gaza and an end to attacks on civilians.

In a setback for hopes for a two-state solution, Israel’s parliament voted by 68 to 9 votes on Thursday against the establishment of a Palestinian state even if it were part of a negotiated settlement with Israel.

Payman entered the Senate after the last election as the third candidate on the Labor ticket in Western Australia, after Sue Lines and Glenn Sterle. Labor gained 511,226 votes for the group ticket above the line on the ballot paper, as well as preferences from others. Lines personally gained 11,913 primary votes, while Sterle received 1285 and Payman gained 1681.

While Payman is not due to face an election until 2028, many voters said she should leave the Senate and hand her seat to Labor, just as some members of the Greens said the same about Lidia Thorpe when she quit their party and moved to the Senate crossbench last year.

The Resolve Political Monitor found that 41 per cent of respondents said Payman should make way for a Labor senator, while 29 per cent said she should stay on as an independent and 30 per cent were unsure.

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